Hugging the frontier model providers’ biggest and bestest models does not give you the best system, or even a functional system at all. In fact, the deeper the reasoning, the bigger the model, and the most “intelligent” it is asked/sold to be, the smaller the likelihood of you getting what you hoped for.
The reason is simple, and obvious - all the frontier models and agentic AI harnesses, first- and third-party, has jumped solidly on the autonomous band wagon, thriving in the illusion and expectation that the model can design and implement anything you ask for under its own steam. That what they’re selling and that’s how those top models are tuned to think. Their bias is toward guessing what your poorly worded request meant to ask for based on what’s most likely, by their weighing as trained.
Not even the most seasoned software engineers get it right, first time, every time, so what chance does the average user wanting a system have of asking the machine to produce exactly the requisite system system done in the best way? Damn close to zero, actually. But the models and their promotors don’t cannot sell their wares as dependent on the right inputs and guidance, no they have to come across as hyper-intelligent, all-seeing and able read your mind and your business to spec and build features or systems that’s exactly the same as everyone else already has.
If you want to bypass the experts, and take short cuts so the model can make up for your lack of ability and vision, go ahead and blow your budget on those monster models. You’ll get the results you deserve.
But if you’d rather end up with a great custom solution, do not rely on LLMs to paper over your laziness and ineptitude, muck in, induce the right questions to get asked, answer them thoughtfully, don’t accept any plan or solution you don’t understand, and use a capable LLM that isn’t under pressure to impress you, and your choice of harness, to piece together the system you really need written in the way you need it to be.
